Science Week. Series of Lectures of the Faculty of Physics

“Nuestra comarca cósmica: de la Tierra Media a Laniakea” (Our Cosmic Region: from the Middle-Earth to Laniakea) delivered by Vicent J. Martínez García, Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics.

When discoverers of the past reached the boundaries of the known world and were afraid of carrying on with their trips, they wrote on their maps: “Hic sunt draconis” (There are dragons here) When other braver discoverers deepened into these lands or seas, they never found dragons but fascinating places. The same has happened to astronomers throughout history.

In this talk we will review how our knowledge of the position that occupies the Earth in the Universe has developed: our cosmic direction. We will see that Astrophysics and Cosmology show us that galaxies are grouped in clusters and filaments, and these in superclusters, leaving huge empty spaces between them, creating a cosmic spider web called structure at large-scale of the Universe.

One of these structures, called Laniakea which means “immense sky” in Hawaiian language, has been recently introduced in an article in the journal “Nature”. We will explain how has it been possible its discovery by means of the mappings of positions and he velocities of galaxies.

Finally, we will explain other ongoing projects in where, through the study of galaxy distribution, we may give answers to some challenges of modern cosmology.